Carve
by Zaedah
Summary: If asked, her general opinion would be that the body had been preferable when it was still stuffed in a milk crate.


_There is blame to be had for this utter nonsense. And her name is Alamo!_

* * *

**Carve**

"You could do something." Olivia Dunham gestured an arm toward the object of collective stares. It was less a suggestion than an order, one summarily ignored by the other witnesses. Not that she could blame them.

"Don't see you swooping in for the save," Peter noted while his rubber soled shoes worked frantically to coagulate to the linoleum. In that moment, he was committed to the 'helping others who help themselves' principle.

Even the softest heart among them was hesitant to interfere with the matter. Astrid's left foot lifted off the ground a fraction, a hovering boot whose finished step never materialized. Brushing heroism aside, she opted for summoning a suitable excuse.

"I can't help. They didn't teach this stuff at the academy."

It was not an unreasonable premise. After all, how exactly does one aid a dying person who was, by all accounts, already dead? Six widened eyes remained fixated on the partial body flopping about like a land-bound fish. The torso and head twitched enough to shake bits of rotting flesh onto the once sanitized floor. Arms extended to perform a flailing orbit seemingly to locate its lower counterpart, which had not been recovered at the scene. A heaving chest and gaping mouth showcased failed breathing attempts not common to corpses. Olivia turned to Peter with an unspoken request shouting in her overly dilated eyes.

"No way." He threw his hands up, backing up two steps. "I'm not doing CPR."

It takes a substantial test of patience for a federal agent to revert to childhood. Olivia's foot stomp heralded the arrival of her infantile side. "I'm not asking you to swap spit with the thing. But can't you stop it from…" she trailed when the body lurched nearly upright. "Doing that?"

"Apparently, no mere mortal can kill it. And therefore, nothing short of God can save it." His shrug was essentially a washing of hands on the issue.

Meanwhile, Astrid's brain was busy sending her images of mouth to mouth corpse resuscitation, much to the detriment of her complexion, now sporting a lovely tint of nausea. If asked, her general opinion would be that the body had been preferable when it was still stuffed in a milk crate.

"Corpse reanimation?" The gruff voice boomed behind the trio. "Fascinating."

Walter Bishop brushed past the team, coffee in unshaking hand. Kneeling down juts out of reach of the now clawing fingers, Walter poked the body's shoulder with the dry end of his coffee stirrer. The light contact did not go unnoticed because the wiggling form turned possum. Some incidental thought on the activities of decomposing nerve endings dripped from Walter's mumbling lips. The trouble with dead bodies is the eventual decaying of flesh, which ensures that limbs once attached are more easily separated during transport. After lifting the stilled body onto the steel table from which it had escaped, an arm left its socket and collided with the floor. The disgusted chorus of the observers only made the old man smile brighter.

Later, when the shuddering subsided, all but one would say it was no way to start a morning. The lone enjoyer of the creepy discovery whistled a lively tune while merrily prodding the remains.

"It's like Christmas day," Walter announced. "Shaking the proverbial box to discern the contents."

Hunched over malfunctioning equipment, Peter rolled his eyes. "Don't even think about shaking that body."

"It did enough shaking already, I suppose." Walter absently kicked the bits of flesh that lay unswept under his boots. "Somewhat androgynous, our departed friend. Did you notice the breast area?"

Peter tucked further into his work, partly ignoring the question and mostly hiding the fact that at that moment, he'd been noticing an entirely different set of breasts. Olivia, oblivious to the sway that had transfixed him, answered;

"Hence calling it 'it' all day. But I'm hoping you can find something to identify it."

Astrid returned from the restroom with a fresh coat of makeup and steadier posture. "And maybe figure out how it decided to jump its dead bones off our table."

Considering the point, Walter looked at each member of the team in turn and then tapped the corpse on the forehead.

"I think our half-it has a tale to tell. But we mustn't rush the story or we'll miss the exciting details." When the old man took up a scalpel, Astrid made a hasty offer of a coffee run.

"I've long been fascinated by the origins of holidays. The early superstitions and such that led to our customs and symbols. Halloween, for instance, began as the festival of Samhain, which celebrated the conclusion of the harvest season. The ancient Gaels would throw the bones of slaughtered livestock into bonfires while wearing customs to impersonate evil spirits."

"Beyond astonishing. And that helps us how?"

Peter's annoyance was as reliable as menstruation, Olivia decided as she gave up typing a report that read more like science fiction.

Walter straightened to stare down his son. "It might provide a context for this unfortunate death. Do be more open to things, boy."

Olivia stepped closer to the table as Walter shone a light against the ragged skin of the torso. The place where hips and legs should be appeared to be sliced with something small and ridged.

"What do you think happened?" The federal agent asked with just enough curiosity to actually want an answer.

"He was, in effect, carved. Rather like a pumpkin." The brilliant scientist, creator of fairly chilling experiments, grinned in admiration. "Very Halloween, don't you think? They did everything but stick a candle in him to complete a jack o'lantern."

When the autopsy began in earnest, the Y-incision revealed the extent of truth in Walter's analogy. Found in the chest cavity was a candle. And a newly returned Astrid dropped the tray of coffees on her journey to the floor.

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**Zaedah got an early jump on Halloween. Feel free to leave an opinion...**


End file.
